


i try twice as hard and i'm half as liked

by linda



Category: Les Misérables (2012), Les Misérables - Victor Hugo
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, M/M, bye, crossing my fingers here that this isn't so out of character that it makes you want to cry
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-07-25
Updated: 2013-07-25
Packaged: 2017-12-21 08:46:11
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,344
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/898283
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/linda/pseuds/linda
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Grantaire can pinpoint the exact moment he falls in love, and he thinks to himself, <i>what the hell</i>?</p>
            </blockquote>





	i try twice as hard and i'm half as liked

It's not a good time for Courfeyrac to storm into the apartment, but then again, Grantaire can't really think of a time that could've been better—or good, for that matter. He squints at his intruder over the mouth of the glass bottle of gin he's been enjoying—although ‘enjoying’ might be a stretch of the truth, considering the quality of the it—where he lies slumped on his shabby sofa.

Three questions forms in Grantaire’s mind as they glare at each other, being [a] what the fuck is Courfeyrac doing in his apartment, [b] why did Grantaire ever think it was be a good idea to give him a key to it and [c] how the hell Grantaire manage to get so horrifyingly absorbed in his own thoughts that he didn’t even notice him entering.

(He can of course answer all of these three questions without skipping a beat, but he might as well play the victim.)

Grantaire notices that Courf eyes the bottle of gin (Gordon’s London Dry Gin) with spurn, and he can’t really blame him; Grantaire has been denied access to the three nearest liquor stores, and not feeling like spending thirty extra minutes sober, he’d set out on an epic quest to scavenge his room for spirits. (And he might’ve nipped over to Combeferre’s room to search through his stuff as well.) The bottle of Gordon’s had been found hidden at the back of Combeferre’s closet, but he figured it went to a good case, so what the hell.

"I’m busy,” Grantaire sulks, naïvely thinking that it’ll get him to leave. It’s also a stretch of the truth, considering that the closest he has gotten to painting in the last five hours has been moving his supplies from his sofa to his cheap coffee table—and that only so he could lie on the sofa without risking an early death. He could visualise the obituary: Grantaire, loved by many, bled to death after stabbed by a pen nib lying in his sofa. He was hoping to leave this world in a classier way than such.

But he’s getting sidetracked, and snaps out of it, noticing that Courf raises an eyebrow as he glances from him to the stack of art supplies strewn over the table in a helter skelter manner. “What do you want, anyway? Combeferre is out,” Grantaire tries.

“Yeah, he’s at the ABC,” Courfeyrac says, slumping down on the sofa besides Grantaire, scooping his feet further in on the couch to make space for both of them. “Which is where we’re going as well.”

Grantaire groans theatrically, his backhand resting on his forehead for a split second for an extra dramatic effect. He doesn’t even know how he could think that Courfeyrac would accost him for any other reason than that, and why he hadn’t realised that this was going to happen earlier, in which case he could’ve revoked his access key. “You’re the _worst,_ Courf,” he says.

Courfeyrac sends him a Look, and his voice has a hard edge to it when he protests with, “ _You_ promised.”

Grantaire rolls the bottle between his palms, concocting a wide variety of excuses in his mind that can possibly get him out of the ordeal once and for all. Unfortunately, the truth (“I don’t care for it”) hasn’t worked so far, so he doubts anything he might come up with at this point won’t fall short. He’s not really surprised that Courfeyrac’s accosting him directly at this point, though: he’s been avoiding their student society like the devil ever since Courfeyrac tried to get him to join at the beginning of the term. They’re already four weeks in, and he’s dodged the subject brilliantly every time it has come up, thank you very much.

“I have enough on my hands," he tries, waving towards the pile of art supplies on the coffee table, but even in Grantaire’s ears it sounds like something from Lame Breakup Lines 101.

Courfeyrac snorts. Loudly. “What,” he says slowly, quirking an eyebrow as he glances from the art supplies to the bottle of gin, “Busy getting drunk and sleeping off the hangover in class? I’m sure you are.” Grantaire might not be sober, but he’s fairly sure that it’s humour he can hear threading through his words.  

“Well, I believe it was Fitzgerald who said to write drunk and edit sober.” Grantaire continues to look guileless, taking another sip of gin before offering Courfeyrac the bottle.

Courf doesn’t even look at it, and instead raises an eyebrow. “Hemingway, actually, and when are you ever sober?” Grantaire waves a hand dismissively, and Courf takes up on the nonverbal cue; “Look. You’ve been promising to tag along every night since we started Les Amis de l’ABC—”

“Which is a ridiculous and not to mention pretentious name for a club, really.”

“—and I’m not going to let you ditch another meeting just because you can’t be arsed to get out of this apartment,” Courfeyrac continues, pretending not to have heard him. Of course, Grantaire can see why it’s Courfeyrac who is trying to convince him to come: Combeferre, while an active member of the ABC and Grantaire’s roommate, is way too gentle to will anyone to do something they don’t want to.

Well, Grantaire has never seen him do it, anyway.

“Did that guy actually convince you to conscript the entire university?” he asks instead, tilting the bottle in his hand slightly.

“Enjolras, rather than ‘that guy’,” Courfeyrac corrects with a frown, and Grantaire notices that he doesn’t object to ‘conscript’. Enjolras. He’s heard them talking of him before, with a reverence Grantaire had never heard them using about anyone before. One of Courfeyrac’s coursemates, burning with the passion of a thousand suns for all things leading to the greater good and equality for all. Enjolras. A guy who won’t take no for an answer on any occassion… An annoying habit he appears to have infected one of Grantaire’s best friends with. “And no. What I did was to promise him that I’d bring my friends, and unfortunately for both of us, you’re one of them.” Okay, well, friend.

Grantaire rolls around in the sofa, burying his face in the worn-out cushions that smells like dust and liquor. “If you considered me a friend you wouldn’t drag me with you to horrible things.” His sulky voice is muffled by the sofa fabric. He may sound like a five year-old. He may not care.

"Look, I've been promising Enjolras every night for three weeks now that I would bring you, and…"

Grantaire snorts before he can stop himself, and turns around for air and to say, "Yes, you did, just like you promised to bring every other human being you know on the face of this Earth. I told you I don't care about your…stuff."

It's true—but then again, there’s very few things on this planet Grantaire cares about, and most of them involve fine art and finer gin.

In his peripheral vision, he can see Courfeyrac knit his brow. “You do realise I’m not going to leave before you agree to come with me, right?” Grantaire takes another swig of the liquor, and feels the cheap gin burn its way down his throat, before shifting to an upright position to stare at Courfeyrac. He stares back, and it feels like a staring contest until Grantaire gives up and slumps back down.

“Fine,” he grits out, pretending not to notice how Courfeyrac’s face lights up. “But I’m bringing Gordon.”

Courfeyrac wrinkles his nose, but doesn’t object. He also doesn’t point out the fact that they’re meeting in a cafe with a bar, and wonders how long he can keep that little nugget of information from his intoxicated friend.

****

*

****

Even though Grantaire needs an arm around Courfeyrac’s neck to keep entirely steady, his friend is in a surprisingly good mood, chatting almost without catching his breath as they walk down the streets. Grantaire fell off the wagon the minute they were outside his building, and has no idea what he’s talking about, only picking up fragments like, “We struggled to find a decent place to hold our meetings, then Jehan, you’ve met Jehan, haven’t you, suggested this attic café downtown and I just gotta say, it’s the perfect spot,” and “You’re going to love Joly. You know, the medical student—he has this really interesting point about the patriarchy which boils down to that…”

Yeah, well, Grantaire never really claimed to be the best listener in the world. What he has noticed, though, is that Courfeyrac has been very careful not to say a word about Enjolras, and Grantaire suddenly wonders how much he’s going to hate him.

It takes a couple of seconds and a Look from Courfeyrac for him to realise that he just might have said that out loud. “What do you mean?” he asks, perplexed.

Grantaire offers him a half-shrug as they continue walking. “I dunno, he’s obviously not the bargaining chip, and you’ve been talking about every person other than him that’s in your soc. Seems sort of odd to leave out the leader.”

“Oh,” Courf says, uncomfortably shifting his weight on his feet. He chooses his next words very carefully, and continues,“It’s just that Enjolras is, I don’t know, someone who’s pretty different from you.”

“Different from me?” Grantaire repeats, annoyed that he doesn’t know whether it’s a compliment or an offense.

“Well, you know, he’s sort of…a very intense idealist, and you are…”

“A nihilist?” Grantaire suggests helpfully.

“Disinterested,” Courfeyrac finishes, frowning.

“Right.” He wonders why Courfeyrac ever thought it would be a good idea to bring Grantaire into their student society, because Enjolras sounds just like the kind of person who’d toss him out on the street after less than ten minutes of conversation. “Anyway, so you just thought you’d throw me into it without any heads up?”

“Didn’t think you’d want to come if I told you about it.”

“I didn’t even want to come in the first place!” Grantaire objects, willing himself not to raise his voice.

“Oh, stop it,” Courfeyrac says with a hint of annoyance, continuing to drag him along the street. “He’s charismatic and charming. You’ll like him.”

Grantaire might be mumbling something along the lines of, “Scar was a charismatic and charming character as well, but that doesn’t mean I’d want to spend an hour in a room with him,” and Courfeyrac stops to glare at him.

“Did you seriously just compare Enjolras to a Disney lion?”

“You were the one supplying the characteristics here.” He can see Courf roll his eyes.

 

*

****

“So you see, the pun’s lost on anyone who didn’t study French in high school, but it’s really funny, because ABC is actually…” Grantaire tunes Joly out as the medical student tries defending the name of their organisation, and instead swallows the last dregs of his gin bottle as he looks over the room. The meeting has yet to start—they’re waiting for Enjolras, according to the guy named Feuilly that’s definitely too old to be a student—but the room is full of people who are laughing and chatting. It shouldn’t surprise Grantaire as much as it does to see most of them carousing and clinking glasses of beer and wine (albeit not in the same one) together.

“Don’t scare him away, Joly,” Grantaire hears Combeferre say with a soft laugh, and turns around to see him approach them with a overflowing glass of what looks like beer and a bottle of wine, leaving a sticky trail all the way from the bar to where they sit at the back. He sits down, and glances around the room like Grantaire had done. “So, what do you think, R?”

Grantaire offers him a smile. “Came for the meeting, but haven’t heard much talk of politics yet.”

Combeferre grins. “Yeah, we’re waiting for Enjolras. Sorry about that.”

“No, it’s…it’s alright,” Grantaire assures him; although he’d much rather sit at home and work, he has to admit that he’s enjoying himself. It’s almost like a night at the bar, and if he drinks enough before the meeting start, it will probably continue to almost be a night at the bar.

Combeferre is about to say something more, but is interrupted when a coughing fit comes over him. He covers his mouth and coughs into his elbow, but Grantaire notices that Joly turns white as a sheet. He’s gone before Combeferre has lowered his arm, and he waves a hand dismissively when he notices how flummoxed Grantaire looks. “He’s always like that, don’t worry. Anyway, I was going to ask, are you going to join the Friends from now on?” It sounds like a cult when Combeferre puts it like that, really.

“Well, it’s been fun so far, so we’ll—” He doesn’t get further before the hinges on the door to the loft emits a loud creak, and the people fall silent as they look towards the door. Grantaire follows their gazes, and feels the ground disappear from under him as he sees him.

“That’s Enjolras,” Combeferre tells him, superfluously, and he might be gesturing towards him, but Grantaire can’t take his eyes off of Enjolras to check.

It's unfair, really, how Enjolras manages to sport something as casual as a red t-shirt and blue jeans—a welcoming contrast to the red—and still look as though he has stepped down from the canvas of one of the greats that Grantaire has spent so long admiring. His hair is a tumble of golden curls, framing a strong jawline and intense eyes that makes Grantaire's fingers twitch. To capture the fire in Enjolras' eyes and the vibrant colour of his skin is suddenly all he wants.

He can pinpoint the exact moment he falls in love, and he thinks to himself, _what the hell?_

“Sorry I’m late,” he hears Enjolras say, smiling as he looks over the group, not seeming to notice the new addition to their group. “Shall we just start?”

**Author's Note:**

> Four things:  
> 1\. The title is from Fun.'s Some Nights
> 
> 2\. This is my first-ever fic, so I'm really afraid that the characterisations might be a bit off, but I'm trying to avoid it the best I can.
> 
> 3\. Bethany is my beloved beta and moral support, and I'm so grateful for you. Thank you!
> 
> 4\. Marius is left out on purpose for now, because he's not a founding member in the Brick. 
> 
> That is all, and thank you so much for reading!


End file.
